Author Fannie Flagg

Fannie Flagg to Deliver UTC Commencement Address

Fannie Flagg, author of Fried Green Tomatoes At the Whistle Stop Café, Chattanooga’s choice for "A Tale for One City," will deliver the UTC spring commencement address on Sunday, May 4th at 2 p.m. at the McKenzie Arena. Approximately 800 students are eligible to receive degrees.

Chattanoogans have been encouraged to read Fried Green Tomatoes At the Whistle Stop Café, and then meet in small groups to discuss it. The program is a way of promoting literacy and encouraging a closer community by finding common ground. Please visit the website of "A Tale for One City" for more information.

The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga is a co-sponsor of this reading program.
Flagg will also visit the faculty of Battle Academy on May 5, and on May 6 Flagg will speak to the student body and faculty at Girls Preparatory School. Also on May 6, Flagg will address interested readers and residents at the Chattanooga Choo-Choo Centennial Theater at 1400 Market Street. There is no admission, and the public is welcome.

Fannie Flagg’s writing and show business career began in the fifth grade, when she wrote, produced, directed, and starred in a three-act comedy entitled "The Whopee Girls," which got the audience hysterical and got Fannie expelled from school because it contained the word "martini." "I’ve always has a dry wit," Fannie explains. She later entered the Miss Alabama contest, winning a scholarship to the Pittsburgh Playhouse, where she distinguished herself as the only girl in the history of the school to fail ballet.

At age nineteen, Fannie began writing and producing television specials, and since then has appeared in more than five hundred television shows and in many motion picture and stage productions. Her credits include Candid Camera, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Love Boat, Love American Style, and films such as Five Easy Pieces, with Jack Nicholson, Stay Hungry and Grease. Her numerous stage roles include a lead in the Broadway production of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. Fannie Flagg lives in Montecito, California.